Gee, Thanks for all the Love
by Kei Tree
Summary: It’s the Last Battle. Hogwarts students are fighting, the Scoobies are providing some much needed cavalry, and Xander Harris finds out a little more than he really wanted to know about another deadbeat dad. Like his existence. BtVSHP
1. Marie Antoinette

**Disclaimer:** I own neither Buffy, nor Harry Potter. Like every fanfiction writer out there, I secretly wish that I did. But I'll save that tired joke for another fic. 

**Timeline:** Buffy, Post Chosen (aka after Season 7). Harry Potter is after Book Five, Order of the Phoenix. Just cause.

**Note on Magical Abilities:** Xander is not a Wizard. Xander will not be a Wizard. The end.

**AN:** For those of you who don't know me, hi, I'm Kei! I mostly post Buffy crosses over at Twisting the Hellmouth, but was missing the other day and decided to share the chapters. And for any who read Labyrinth- I will be returning to my unfinished stories one day- I can't help myself.

I finally gave in to a "Xander's Real Father" Challenge. Not sure if the Challenge is still up, but I'm following more the basic idea than the specifics. Would REALLY like some feedback on this, I'm not sure how I feel about it.

And yes, the title is a Douglas Adams reference. I can't get the damn theme song out of my head, and I was totally lacking for title ideas.

* * *

**Gee, Thanks for all the Love: Prologue**

You know, of all the ways Xander Harris had imagined he'd die over the years, being hexed by men wearing DRESSES was not one of them. He skidded to an abrupt halt on the stone floor as he heard the screamed curse, arms wind-milling, and watched exasperated as a stream of green light went sailing by, inches from his chest.

Stupid Avada Kedavra. Join the thirteenth century and use a goddamn stake!

There were clusters of bodies on the floor, and people still trying their best to kill each other in the halls, but Xander was on a mission. A typical Xander Harris mission.

Save Buffy.

Although all in all, things weren't going bad for a Last Battle. The Voldemort dude and his followers weren't taking their ass whoppin' lying down, okay quite honestly before Buffy and Scoobies had shown up with a veritable army of mini-Slayers things for the side of light had looked pretty grim, but it was amazing what a little hard work and utter ruthlessness could do to help win a war. And now here they were, fighting to the bitter end in the hallways of Hogwarts.

With everyone wearing dresses.

Willow's power shot by his head, clearing a path towards the Great Hall. He turned, blew his best friend a kiss, and sprinted onwards, pausing only to thump an errant and Death Eater or two across the head with the Scythe on his way. Hermione Granger was just about to get gutted by a Death Eater who had figured out what the pointy end of a knife was for, for instance, when Xander sped by and took the bastard down a solid thump on the back of the neck. The young witch flashed him a brilliant, feral smile, and leapt back into the fray.

Good girl.

Xander allowed himself a moment of righteous outrage on the Golden Trio's behalf though, mostly because he and his better halves knew, more than anyone on this screw-ball planet of theirs, how utterly awful it was to have the mask ripped off of life as a child. To not just see things most adults would run screaming in terror from, but to have to stand up to all those monsters under the bed and hope to God they didn't kill you.

It got so much harder after the first death.

The doors to the Great Hall were askew, and it was a lot quieter here than in the rest of the castle. Xander wasn't fooled though because, if Buffy was in there, this was where all the really scary stuff was going down. He paused for a moment in his headlong dash at the threshold, took a deep breath, and without a backward look for the life he was probably leaving behind, ran in.

* * *

He saw Buffy first of course. Not much mattered outside of that, really, because as long as Buffy was still around things couldn't totally go to Hell on Earth. The Powers owed them, her, too much for that. Although Xander was sure they'd debate that point endlessly.

Bastards.

She was crouched by the side of Dumbledore, and though they both looked very much the worse for wear, Xander was pleased to see a nice mound of dead and incapacitated Death Eaters around them both. Xander wasn't totally convinced that Albus Dumbledore was really as powerful as everyone seemed to think, but Wills had brightly told him that he was almost as strong as she was and, well, that was enough for him.

The elderly wizard was looking very old today, and blood streaked his long, white beard, but there was a fierce light in the twinkling eyes that was positively bloodthirsty. Rather like young Hermione Granger. Buffy was, quite clearly, visibly, pissed off. She hadn't looked over at him yet, but he could tell by the rigid set of her shoulders and the visible tightness of her body that she was one or two badly worded insults away from cracking.

That was reassuring too in a way. Buffy got so much more done when she had worked herself into a self-righteous rage.

And then there was Harry. Harry Potter, supposed savior of the Wizarding world. Ever since the Scoobies had exploded into the quaint warring world of Wizards a month and a half ago, Buffy had played fiercely protective Big Sister to the young savior from day one, after a somewhat lengthy explanation of course. The mothering seemed to have given the young boy enough spine to be standing defiantly in front of the Wizard who was responsible both for his parents' deaths, and his own somewhat miserable lot in life. Harry Potter obviously stood in guard of Buffy and Dumbledore, his wand raised defiantly, chin jutted out, glasses askew.

It was cute.

What was NOT cute was the fact that, despite three of the Light's big guns being in the room, despite all Death Eater bodies either moaning or lying suspiciously still in little piles around said three big guns, there were at least another thirty Death Eaters in the room. What was worse, in Xander's opinion though, was that while Dumbledore, Harry, and Buffy all looked somewhat the worse for wear, and stupid red-eyed Voldemort looked like he'd just woken from a particularly blood curdling nap.

And old Voldie was flanked by Henchman 1, all silver eyes and icy blonde Lucius Malfoy, and Henchman 2, dark and brooding, whom Xander assumed to be Severus Snape, Spy for the Side of Bad. Also known as Hogwarts' Potions Professor, or as Ron was always calling him- "that greasy git". Xander knew Lucius mostly by reputation, and the fact that Draco, who was currently fighting HIS little traitorous heart out, side by side with Ginny Weasley of all people, was the spitting image of dear ol' Dad.

"Hey guys," Xander said casually as he inched towards Buffy, who was watching the Scythe in his hands like a cat watching a plump, tender, ass kickin' mouse. "Nice party you've got going on here. Very Apocalypse Now." Buff flashed him a grateful grin that was part benevolent friendship, part sheer relief because with the Scythe in the game, well, the stakes had just significantly improved for the Side of Good.

Dumbledore, bless his powerful heart, looked bemused, and Harry was looking at him like he was fifty-two cards short of a deck. A quick glance at the angry Trio of Bad showed them sharing a remarkable resemblance to Harry. Apparently just strolling in on a little Death and Mayhem Jamboree just "wasn't done"!

It was kinda fun being a party crasher/life saver some days.

Voldemort's red gaze narrowed as he briefly studied, and then dismissed Xander for the non-entity that he was. Just another fool who would soon die a horrible and agonizing death. It was almost touching, really. But then something strange happened as Voldemort raised his head slightly and, just SNIFFED.

And suddenly Xander Lavelle Harris found himself pinned by that inhuman red glare as Mr. Snakey breathed in again, his eyes resting on the slash across Xander's forehead as his forked tongue flickered out, and tasted the air. So there Xander was, standing dumbly in the middle of the Great Hall of Hogwarts during the great Last Battle for the Wizarding World, and Voldemort, Tom Riddle, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named had apparently decided that he wanted to join the long line of people to screw with Xander Harris.

Buffy had apparently noticed the same thing because she was at his side in a flash, too fast even for the remaining Death Eaters to stop, hands on her slender hips as she stared up at her newest Big Bad. But even Buffy glaring in all her splendid post-Slaying glow wasn't enough to distract You-Know-Who.

"Lucius," Voldemort commanded curtly as his eyes stayed riveted on Xander, "who is this newest guest of ours?"

Lucis Malfoy's own silver gaze raked him over, found him lacking, predictably, and answered his Lord. "His name is Alexander Harris and he is party to these… Slayers." Xander's own one eye narrowed dangerously. Oh, so someone thought THEY could do disdain so well. White-haired freak. "He is, to my knowledge, completely without power or, potential use."

Xander's mouth tightened and twitched with that pot shot. "Oh, I don't know," he drawled as Buffy poked him in the ribs and stepped closer to him, "I make a pretty damn good human shield, and I can do snarky like no one's business."

Voldemort threw his head back and laughed. Okay, really, he cackled, because it was freakin' creepy. And Xander was wishing he had learned his little lesson about shutting up a couple of Big Bads ago. Unlike Buffy, Faith, and the more spirited Girls, he did NOT have super powers to take out the uglies of the world after he pissed them off.

Just dumb luck.

And friends with a hell of a lot of power.

Oh, and some twenty odd years of survival experience on the what was once the world's most active Hellmouth. That HAD to count for something.

"If you get yourself killed, so help me," Buffy whispered fiercely, "I'll resurrect you!"

Ouch, okay, that pot shot was well-deserved.

Volie the Molding had stopped laughing and was staring unnervingly at Xander once again. So unnervingly that Xander didn't protest a meep when Buffy got as close as she could without being IN his pants. The Dark Lord was apparently done with questioning HIM though.

"Severus, tell me, how old would your son be now if you hadn't strangled him with your bare hands on my orders?"

You know, Xander wouldn't have said the Great Hall had exactly been a center of activity and noise, but even the groans of the dying Death Eaters stopped with that delicately poised question. The silence, excuse the clichéd pun, was deafening. And now Henchman 2 was staring at him searchingly too.

This was not going to end well. Even if they DID win.

"He would be twenty-six years of age," came Severus Snape's sharp, biting reply. And then, almost as an afterthought, "My Lord."

Voldemort hissed softly. "Yes, pity that. I'm sure, worthless or no, he would have grown into the spitting image of his mother." Buffy and Xander watched, fascinated, as Severus Snape's face was transformed, just for an instant, into a grief so deep it was painful to see. "But sometimes" Voldemort continued softly, "those that we love serve us best in death."

And that was all the warning ANYONE had before Voldemort's wand shot out and the Dark Lord started to scream the curse that would make the world short one less Greasy Git. Dumbledore's cry of denial was all Buffy needed, ever a girl of action, to throw herself at Voldemort, but not before throwing her beloved Scythe at the startled Harry Potter.

Buffy knocked the startled Dark Lord to the ground with all the impressive weight of her slim, Fates enhanced body.

Dumbledore raised his own wand and hexed Lucius Malfoy as he attempted to perform his proper duties as Henchman 1 and kill Buffy.

The very confused Death Eaters milling behind this whole scene blinked in shock as Xander screamed at the stunned Harry Potter. "NOW YOU BLEEDING IDIOT!"

And bless his little prophecy burdened heart, Harry Potter sprinted forward those few precious yards to where Buffy was pinning the greatest Dark Wizard of all time, Willow excluded of course, to the cobblestones and, with one clean swipe, cut off his head.

Xander resisted, just barely, making a Marie Antoinette joke.


	2. Unconscious is Almost Dead

Timeline: Buffy, Post Chosen (aka after Season 7). Harry Potter is after Book Five,  
Order of the Phoenix. Just cause.

Note on Magical Abilities: Xander is not a Wizard. Xander will not be a Wizard.  
The end.

AN: This fic is not dead. I've just been distracted... Check out my livejournal  
for updates for anything I do, fic or fanart, wise.

http/dialinghell. chapter will be longer, much, I so decree. Thanks for reading. :)

**Gee, Thanks for All the Love: Chapter 1**

Severus Snape had never expected to survive the war. He had been too intimately involved in the dirty laundry on both sides. Propriety, if nothing else, would insure that he got a well-deserved Unforgivable curse thrown at his back at some point and that would be that.

He certainly hadn't expected to live long enough to see Voldemort's head wiped clean off his shoulders in the only useful thing Potter had ever done in all the seventeen years of his miserable existence. What's more, he hadn't even begun to imagine ever getting to see his son in the afterlife, if there was one for men like him, let alone in the flesh and blood, side by side with one of the most powerful women in the world.

There was a deep, stunned silence in the Great Hall as Voldemort's head, propelled by momentum from Potter's frantic swing, rolled slowly and unevenly across the floor before it rested at his son's feet. His son, Alexander, Alexander Harris, looked down, wrinkled his nose, and gave the head a distasteful kick.

This time it rolled towards them and stopped at Lucius's feet. Severus watched, face impassive, as his old friend's mouth convulsed once, twice, before an inarticulate howl of rage and grief tore from the older man's throat. The sound galvanized the rest of Severus's brethren into action, and the remaining thirty or so Death Eaters swarmed the five of them, intent on completing this last task for the Lord and Master.

In the immediacy of the melee, Severus lost sight of Dumbledore's forces and was faced, literally, with the wizard who would likely claim his life. In the crush of bodies and flashing green curses, Lucius Malfoy was shoved against him, his silver eyes wild as he screamed, "How long!" His wand pressed viciously against Severus's throat as fighters pressed them even closer.

Severus's own voice was cold and controlled, the voice he had used to terrorize his students into some form of competency for over two decades. "Since the night Voldemort ordered me to kill my son."

His words seemed to remove Lucius's last support and Severus stumbled as the larger wizard sunk against him. "We trusted you," his old friend murmured. And behind that simple statement was the implied accusation that He, Lucius Malfoy, had well and truly trusted him as well, as more than a follower of the Dark Lord; as a confidant, a friend.

Severus laughed woodenly. "You of all people should have known better than that."

"Then that is a mistake I shall have to remedy." And just like that, his time HAD come. But oddly enough, even in the chaos of the Last Great Battle, with Voldemort's head being kicked about like a bloody ball, he felt a deep and abiding sense of peace, of release. He hadn't expected that, hadn't begun to dream that he had repented enough to be allowed such a small sign of absolution. Lucius jammed the wand so hard against his windpipe that Severus, dimly, could feel it pass through the flesh of his neck. Could feel, with the clarity that some would say comes with death, the warmth of the small trickle of blood congealing and sliding down his neck. "AVADA…"

And honestly, Severus Snape would have been perfectly content to die right there.

But the bodies shifted suddenly, and his eyes widened as he met his son's one eye over Lucius's shoulder, at his back. Alexander Harris had managed to get roughed up in the scramble already. There was the cut on his forehead that had started this whole melee, but now there was also a rough abrasion across his left cheek, and his eye was already darkening into what would be a terrific black eye. Severus opened his mouth, though his couldn't have said if he was going to say something to the man who was part his flesh and blood, or to speak to his oldest friend who was about to kill him. But there wasn't any time for words.

Just for Alexander Harris to bring up a silver serving platter he must have grabbed from who knows where in order to smash it in all its House Elf, spit-polished glory, across the back of Lucius's unsuspecting head. And the Second In Command to He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named dropped like a tree. A tall, blonde, angry tree.

Father and Son regarded each other in the din of battle. And all the usually acerbically articulate Severus could think to say was, "You're NOT supposed to be here."

Alexander blinked once, twice, and shrugged, a gesture that was half-defensive, and more than a little angry. "Yeah, well, YOU'RE not supposed to EXIST!"

Severus blinked once, twice, opened and closed his mouth because, well, he was right.

* * *

"Dawnie told me what happened in the Great Hall."

Buffy's mouth frowned as she turned her worried glance from the castle window to the most powerful witch in existence, on either side of the Atlantic. "Hey Wills."

The redhead had emerged from the battle mostly unscathed, though once the Death Eaters figured out exactly how powerful she was, they started nearly killing themselves in order to get away from the Wicked Witch of SunnyD. Buffy herself was showing her age. That last desperate Death Eater brawl had almost been the end of her, and three days later she was still sporting cracked rubs, a fractured ankle, and more burns and lacerations than she really cared to think about.

Stupid magic. The Slayerey Goodness Package gave them all some natural immunity from nasty spells used by the robe wearers, but that tended to mean energy was diverted from normal attributes, like super fast healing, to replace the expenditure. Overlooking the fact that Buffy could have become her very own ball of green energy with all the killing curses she had dodged and deflected, it still sucked because she HURT.

And even more fun, now that they were with a group of people perfectly capable of knitting and fixing everything that was wrong with her, thanks to her ever helpful Slayer metabolism and natural immunity to hocus pocus, any attempts at magical healing resulted in a big fat waste of time. And one really pissed off Mediwitch.

"She heard from Annie, who told Hannah, who…"

Buffy rubbed her bare arms, wishing she had bothered with a sweater. She used to wear them in California, you'd think she'd be bright enough to remember them in Scotland. "Who heard from whom?"

Willow snorted, impatient. "Dumbledore, of course."

Her arms dropped to her sides, still chilled. "Of course," Buffy snapped dryly. The interfering old twinkly-eyed busybody.

The redhead sighed and joined the oldest Slayer at the window. She didn't have to stand on her tiptoes to peer out, a fact for which Buffy sent her a long-suffering glare, but even through the remnants of the morning fog, Xander was still clearly visible, sitting on the far edge of the lake. Occasionally patting a stray tentacle that got too friendly.

"He won' talk about it."

And Buffy, for the life, or hell, or even DEATH, of her couldn't figure out how to make him. That bothered her, because Xan, in all his smart-mouthed glory, was glib and out of place during the most inopportune of times in all the right, Xander shaped ways. She hadn't been quite sure how to live with this solemn, contemplative MAN of the last three days.

Willow had made her little soul searching journey from computer dork to lesbian dark witch, and on to lesbian white witch playing the field, and Buffy had gone from Valley Girl to the obnoxious martyrdom of her teen years, and now, at twenty-six, found herself set somewhere near den mother to a bunch of hormonal killers with acne and training bras. But Xander's metamorphoses was harder, less visible to trace, and more profound perhaps because of it.

Willow reached up, her fingers tracing Xander's distant figure through the glass, a worried frown on her lips.

"What about Daddy Dearest?" Buffy asked.

"Still out cold in the infirmary. Expected to be spacey for at least a few more days."

"Good."

Willow laughed. "You going to kill him?"

She shrugged elegantly. "It's crossed my mind. Repeatedly. On rewind even. I'll wait for Xand's verdict, though Snapey will be getting the ice pick lecture regardless." Although, if Daddy Dearest, despite being unmasked as a double agent for the Side of Good, was STILL as unpleasant as he'd been made out to be, an ice pick may just accidentally materialize at his hospital bed while he was still recuperating.

Den mothers had far fewer scruples than martyring Slayers.

"You think I could maybe beat him up… just a little?" Buffy asked hopefully.

Willow laughed as her as dancing eyes turned to her friend. "Not nice. He's unconscious."

A rueful grin spread across Buffy's lips, despite her best intentions. "Well, yeah, every Vampire I've ever beat the hell out of has been, well DEAD. You've never complained before."

"None of them were ever Xander's Dad before."

Buffy snorted. "Dracula wanted to be his Sugar Daddy."

The redhead groaned and punched her arm lightly. "SO doesn't count."


End file.
